1. Creative Thinking & Six Thinking Hats
22 April 2010

2. Birthday Partner
Mingle in the group and identify the person whose birthdate (not year - just month and date) is closest to your own. Find out two things you have in common.

3. Why thinking skills? Drie fundamentele professionele vaardigheden in de 21e eeuw Nee

4. How well do schools prepare students to join today’s world?
Bron: Society for Human Resource Management (2009)
Topic of discussion is how good your college or institute is dealing with equipping the students/children for 21st Century skills.
It takes more than just changing the education. It also has to do with a new mentality.
Let students/children discuss what changes they see coming.

5. How well do schools prepare students to join today’s world?
“Our schools, on the whole, are hostile to ideas. Too often, our tests ask students to come up with the one right answer, and the curriculum, pegged to tests, penalizes the creative student rather than rewarding him or her for the unexpected but thoughtful – or even brilliant response.”
Tough Choices or Tough Times (2008)

6. Why this strange behavior?
A man goes to work every day. He works at the 14th floor in a large office building.
In the morning he takes the elevator to the 6th floor. After that he takes the stairs to the 14th floor. However, he only does so when there are no other people in the elevator.
If there are other people in the elevator he takes the elevator straight to the 14th floor. Every night he takes the elevator to the ground floor.
What is the reason for this strange behavior?
All answers are correct of course
Just be surprised of the answers the students will supply
Teach them that all answers that could be right, are right!

7. Illustratie uit Shift Really Happens!

8. Illustratie uit Shift Really Happens!

9. Illustratie uit Shift Really Happens!

10. Is it the same as intelligence?
What is creativity?
Is it the same as intelligence?
Is it Art or Science?
Can you learn it?
Etc. 10

11. Useless creativity? 11

12. Useless creativity? 12

13. Useless creativity? 13

14. Useless creativity?

15. Creativity Basic skills
Observation
Suspension of judgment
Associative thinking
Imagination
Try to listen more to you gut feeling
Open up for new ideas from others
Be curious
Imagine that a new adventure can start at any given moment
Get inspired
Try and look at the positive side of things
Try to find things that are not routine or not normal
If you give this an effort you will find that creative thinking get’s easier and easier.
Just do it
Thinking about alternatives 15 15

16. Perception; watching and seeing
Perception is one of the most important parts of thinking.
Perception is what we do in our minds, not just what comes through our eyes.
Different people may look at the same thing and yet perceive it very differently.
In thinking perception is really important.
In creative thinking the reality does not have to be the same as the perception of reality. 16

17. Salvador Dali: ‘Swans reflecting elephants’ 1937
Perception
Salvador Dali: ‘Swans reflecting elephants’ 1937
Salvador Dali: Zwanen die olifanten reflecteren ‘Swans reflecting elephants’ 1937 17

18. Count the number of F’s.
FINISHED FILES ARE THE RE- SULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIF- IC STUDY COMBINED WITH THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS
Excercise
Count the number of F’s in the text
Many will see only three where there are six.
Let them count again.
The human brain will not process the word “OF”
The ones that count six at first had are real geniusses
3 is normal
Less is alarming

19. Count the number of F’s.
FINISHED FILES ARE THE RE- SULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTIF- IC STUDY COMBINED WITH THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS
Excercise
Count the number of F’s in the text
Many will see only three where there are six.
Let them count again.
The human brain will not process the word “OF”
The ones that count six at first had are real geniusses
3 is normal
Less is alarming 19

20. Suspension of judgment

21. Suspension of judgment
Assignment
Think about your favorite object and …

22. Suspension of judgment
Assignment
Think about your favorite object and … come up with two disadvantages

23. Associations
(flower)
When I think of a train, I think of … 23

24. Associations (chain) When I think of tape, Ik think of posters.
When I think of posters, I think of …
When I think of …., I think of …
Limit this exercise to 4 or 5 associations 24

25. Design a chair that does not have 4 legs
Assumption
A chair has (4) legs
Design a chair that does not have 4 legs

26. Chair becomes … sitting concept

27. Chair becomes … sitting concept

28. Chair becomes … sitting concept

29. Chair becomes … sitting concept

30. Chair becomes … sitting concept
Mart Stam (1926):

31. A chair with no back legs…
…relying for support on the properties of
the material from which it is made.

32. What is out there. What are our (underlying) values
What is out there? What are our (underlying) values? What is going on in our mind?
What is the usual way of thinking about a table? (the concept of a table)
Useful…
You can put something on it …
Has four legs…
On the ground…
Is made of wood, steel, plastic…
Square, round, rectangular …
You can sit down and talk after dinner…
Meeting place
Think of the following two questions;
What do you want to keep as it is?
What challenge can you find to create change?

33. Design a new table

34. YES and NO are not allowed
Alternatives
YES and NO are not allowed 34

35. A lateral assignment 35

36. Short Break

37. Six Thinking Hats Tools for parallel thinking
Before presenting this you might want to google some back ground information if you are not already familiar with the concept.

38. Dr. Edward de Bono

39. Dr. Edward de Bono
Originator of Six Thinking Hats®, Lateral Thinking, and Direct Attention Thinking Tools (based on CoRT)

40. Six Thinking Hats Red Hat Blue Hat Yellow Hat Green Hat Black Hat
Managing the Thinking Process
Red Hat
Intuition and Feelings
Yellow Hat
Benefits and Value
Green Hat
Alternatives and Creative Ideas
Black Hat
Caution, Difficulties and Weaknesses
White Hat
Information
Available and Needed

41. Discussion I The marriage contract should be renewed every five years.
Split up in small groups, max 5 persons.
Afterwards: Do a plenairy session on the outcomes.

42. Discussion II
The marriage contract should be renewed every five years.
Repeat the excersise using this exact order of hats.
Again plenairy session afterwards
Take 15 minutes for the excercise and 15minutes for the plenairy session/. 42

43. Red Hat What are my feelings right now?
What does my intuition tell me?
What is my gut reaction?

44. White Hat What information is available? What information do we need?
How are we going to get the missing
information?

45. Yellow Hat What are the benefits? What are the positives?
What are the values?
Is there a concept in this idea that looks attractive?
Can this be made to work?

46. Black Hat What could be the possible problems?
What could some of the difficulties be?
What are points for caution?
What are the risks?

47. Green Hat What creative ideas do we have? What are the alternatives?
How can we overcome the black hat difficulties?

48. Blue Hat Where should we start? What is the agenda?
What are the objectives?
Which hats should we use?
How can we summarize?
What should we do next?

49. Some more thoughts to use a six hats strategy on …
Students should nominate the worst teacher in school who then will be fired.
It is time for the United States of Europe
Lessons should be planned between am and pm
English should be the univeral language in Europe.

50. Revolutionary Nature of Parallel Thinking
We have many thinking tools for argument/debate, but few for ordinary thinking
The Six Hats method releases us from argument and lays out all the views in parallel
We can also separate out different aspects of thinking with the hats
The Six Hats method is used successfully worldwide

51. a b a b a b Adversarial Thinking Parallel Thinking
The Six Hats method replaces adversarial thinking with Parallel Thinking a b a b

52. The Six Hats Framework Ask people to switch thinking modes
Separate out thinking
Separate ego from performance
Explore subjects in parallel
Signal the next process

53. Why the Hats Metaphor?
There is a traditional link between “thinking” and “hats”
Hats indicate certain roles

54. Key Points Six Hats Six Colors Six Types of Thinking Not Categories
The hats are not descriptions of thinkers
Each thinker should be able to use
all of the hats
Six Hats
Six Colors
Six Types of Thinking
Not Categories
The hats are not descriptions of thinkers
Each thinker should be able to use all of the hats

55. Ways to Use the Hats Individual use Conversation use Meeting use
Reports, memos, , and presentation use

56. S y s t e m a t i c When to Use a Hats Sequence Strongly held views
Rambling discussion
Time is short
Not one right sequence
Use each hat more than once or not at all
Exercise
Think of some thesis and produce your own thinking strategies

57. Tips for Success Practice! Practice! Practice! Be prepared.
Explain the hats simply.
Insist on the terminology.
Start with easy issues.
Derek Parra

58. Questions?

59. Thank you! Harry van der Schans h.vanderschans@kw1c.nl
Theo Prinssen
Koning Willem I College / School for the Future